This time, Mark's storytelling hits us with a
frighteningly familiar – yet subtly altered – world. It presents a society
where artificial intelligence (AI) has devastated jobs, and what remains of the
Welfare State has become an integral part of an unforgiving system of
government surveillance.

Drawing upon such disparate themes as austerity and
welfare reform, social inequality and poverty, security versus civil liberty, Citizen
Zero throws into the mix our often-blind faith in new technology, to offer
a powerful critique of the here and now seen through the lens of an intense
science fiction thriller.

Told with an uncompromising voice through the eyes of
characters from wildly different social strata, Citizen Zero asks some
disturbing questions about where we’re headed.

In this version of the future, Britain is a seemingly
prosperous consumer society under the strong and stable leadership of Prime
Minister Alex Carlisle. But appearances can be deceiving.

This is a society bitterly divided between rich and poor,
where an excluded underclass known as ‘zeros’ eke out an existence any way they
can. The threats of crime and terrorism are used to justify the pervasive
system of high-tech surveillance.

The novel's protagonist, unemployed David Mills,
languishes on the verge of becoming a zero himself, but then he’s ordered to
take part in the government JobNet recruitment scheme. Within its advanced
virtual reality world, David is offered the chance to build a worthwhile future
and rejoin society. Of course, you know it’s just too good to be true.

David becomes an unwitting pawn in a conspiracy to topple
the Government when he’s used to infiltrate an intelligent virus into the
system. JobNet is the weakest link, David the ideal carrier, for an attack
intended to unravel the AI networks that underpin the surveillance machine, and
set the zeros free.

When the virus strikes, chaos ensues. The zeros rise.
Britain falls into anarchy as the Government begins to lose control. The Prime
Minister’s grip on power comes to depend on the life or death of a single zero
– that would be David.

So begins a desperate manhunt across two worlds – the real
and the virtual – to find him before it’s too late.

David, meanwhile, is trapped inside a corrupted reality.
Tormented, alone, he searches a nightmare landscape for a means to escape back
into the real world. It seems hopeless, but there’s something waiting for him
in the heart of JobNet: an inhuman secret that will change everything.

“Dystopias are always more about the world we live in
today than the alternative realities they present, and that's just as true of Citizen
Zero,” Mark says. “We've had seven years of austerity, living standards
have stagnated, social mobility has stalled, inequality has risen, and there's
a growing sense of discontent with the way things are going. In many respects,
we’re already living through dystopian times. Often, it's felt as if we're
living through the novel's real-life prequel. Citizen Zero taps into all
of that. The aim is to give readers an entertaining scare – but I hope the
novel provokes a little thought too.”

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Is this the future we made?

Welcome To 'Broken Britain'

JobNet was supposed to usher in a better life for unemployed David Mills; instead it plunges him into a bitter struggle to survive when he becomes a pawn in a political conspiracy that pushes Britain to the brink of civil war...

“Those people are no-hopers.”

“And what does that make me?”

In a bitterly divided nation where security trumps civil liberty, unemployed David is on the verge of sinking into the ‘Zeros’ – a destitute underclass numbering millions. But then JobNet's advanced virtual reality world offers him a gateway to a worthwhile future, and a chance to rejoin society.

But David is an unwitting pawn in a deadly conspiracy to topple the Government: he's the ideal carrier for an intelligent virus designed to shatter the system and set the Zeros free.

When the virus activates, chaos ensues and the Zeros rise. David is left trapped inside a corrupted reality. If it doesn't shatter his sanity, the secret he finds there will change everything...

Sometimes even a pawn can hold the balance of power.

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About The Author

A coffee-guzzling journalist
turned novelist and occasional poet, Mark Cantrell lives and works by the weave
of his words.

He is the author of two
novels, Citizen Zero (2017) and Silas Morlock (2013), both published by Inspierd Quill. Mark has also written a host of short stories, and a multitude of articles and
thought-provoking essays.

Over the years, his writings have appeared in a
number of small press 'zines, websites, and multi-author collections. He also writes regularly on social, political and cultural issues, on his blog and other platforms.

His fictional work tends to
fall into the realms of science fiction and fantasy, with a little macabre
horror thrown in for good measure, but he's not averse to touching upon social
and political themes too.

Born and bred in Bradford,
Mark now lives in Stoke-on-Trent, though he remains proud of his Yorkshire
heritage.